The bottom line is clear: Our vital interests in Afghanistan are limited and military victory is not the key to achieving them. On the contrary, waging a lengthy counterinsurgency war in Afghanistan may well do more to aid Taliban recruiting than to dismantle the group, help spread conflict further into Pakistan, unify radical groups that might otherwise be quarreling amongst themselves, threaten the long-term health of the U.S. economy, and prevent the U.S. government from turning its full attention to other pressing problems. -- Afghanistan Study Group

Sunday, November 18, 2012

Three Afghan National Police steal 29 million Afghanis (about $550,000) from the branch of the National Bank of Afghanistan in Nouristan province they were assigned to guard. Two of them have been captured, with most of the cash, the third is at large. They were captured in the home of the previous head of security for the province.

Every war produces generals glorified into heroes by government,
media and their own public relations efforts. Gen. Petraeus, who
commanded US occupation forces in first Iraq, then Afghanistan,
continues to be hailed as a “military genius” and “war hero.”

Look again. Petraeus and his fellow generals used every weapon in
the US arsenal against Iraq’s eleven resistance groups (deceptively
misnamed “al-Qaida” by Washington), including the mass ethnic cleansing
of two million Sunni Iraqis, death squads, torture, and brutal
reprisals. . . .

Petraeus was then sent to work his magic in Afghanistan before returning
to Washington to head CIA. There, the brainy general, who had a knack
for self-promotion and public relations, tried again to crush the
Pashtun resistance by massive bombardments, billions in high tech gear,
reprisals that wiped out entire villages, search and destroy
missions. Torture and executions were as common as during the Soviet
occupation. . . .

Cost of Afghan War: $1 trillion and rising. Afghan dead unknown. US military, some 2,100 dead, 17,000 wounded. The US military has clearly been fought to a standstill in
Afghanistan by medieval tribesmen with AK-47’s, reconfirming its name -
“graveyard of empires. As for the military genius of Gen. Petraeus, recall the famous cry of King Pyrrhus, “one more such victory and we are lost.”